Objectively Disordered

Readers may be interested in a significant change made in the Catechism
of the Catholic Church (1993) concerning homosexuality.

The official edition of this most important work is now not the French but
the Latin (Catechismus Catholicae Ecclesia, 1997), and it contains
a correction of the official teaching of the Church.

In the French/English paragraph 2358, we read, “The number of men and
women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. They do
not choose their homosexual condition; for most of them it is a trial.”

“They do not choose their homosexual condition” was open to a
reading contrary to the historic moral teaching of the Church, as articles in
the liberal Jesuit magazine America illustrate.

The 1997 Latin edition (in translation) contains the received moral teaching
of the Church in a much clearer manner in paragraph 2358. The second sentence
reads: “This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes
for most of them a trial” (Latin, p. 598).

Objectively disordered, that is, contrary to nature, and contrary to God’s
purpose within nature and for the relation of the sexes and for procreation.
However, as another Vatican document states, “it is not a sin as such
but it is a more or less strong tendency towards an intrinsic moral evil and
thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder” (CDF-PCHP,
1986, note 3).

Thus, all the loving pastoral care of the Church is to be offered to those
who have this objective disorder so that they may overcome its inclinations
and be chaste for Christ’s sake and for their own sanctification and maturity.

“Objectively Disordered” first appeared in the July/August 1998 issue of Touchstone. If you enjoyed this article, you'll find more of the same in every issue.

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